


Mage

by sissyhiyah



Category: VIII
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-18
Updated: 2012-08-17
Packaged: 2017-11-12 09:07:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/489158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sissyhiyah/pseuds/sissyhiyah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Magic and learning.  The instructor once had to be a student herself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The girl is slim, though well-muscled and strong. Flat belly, lean thighs, small breasts. She's a swimmer. He can see it as she circles the beast, how she seems to be feeling the air around it as she would test the current before diving. Her eyes are clear, intelligent, though they're beginning to dim with exhaustion. The moon has almost reached its zenith, bright and full, dulling the light of the stars around it. None of the others have lasted more than an hour before and this night is half over. There hasn't been a casting ceremony like this in at least ten and five cycles.

The wyrm twists on itself when she darts in again. Once, twice, then she leaps to the side, her arm dripping with blood to the elbow. The priest sniffs in disgust. The hatchlings always smell worse than the great wyrms, their throats not yet able to burn the oily fluid bubbling in their guts. The stench seems to seep from their scales, just now fading from glossy black to the deep ruby for which the dragons were named. He hates that scent, so reptilian and cold, as if copper had decayed and frozen to the earth.

She circles it again, slower, carefully avoiding its snapping jaws. Occupied with watching its fangs, she has forgotten the tail. He's pleased when she's knocked onto her back and sent tumbling. The blow seems to have sharpened her, frightened her. She rubs her palms on her thighs, brushing sand from her fingers.

The wyrm hisses, grit and saliva dripping from its jaws. Even if it kills her, it will never breathe fire. It seems to know this. He can see the yellow eyes focus on her with something approaching hatred.

A young man just on the edge of the firelight takes a step forward. The priest glowers at him. Twice already he's had to hold her admirers to the border of the holy grounds so she can complete her test. He'll not allow any interruptions. Not this time.  
The girl circles again, venturing farther from the beast with every pass. It leaps at her like a serpent, over and over again, then draws back within its coils. She lifts her arms and it lunges again, but she's moved just out of its strike range.

She circles again, watching.

The priestesses have chosen well. This one is patient. She's not like the others, the ones that follow their fathers and brothers during the hunt so they feast on another's kill. His mouth tightens in a grim line. As if they could fool anyone. The ceremony for them to gain the magic and they already have it? Cowards. They'll never know the power this one will know, provided she lives. The spells are stronger when they're torn from the living beasts and eaten while the blood still flows from the kill.

The high priest almost smiles. This one would never follow her father and allow him to kill her first spell-beast.

A faint sucking sound sputters wetly from the hole in its throat. She's pierced the fire gland, that deadly soft spot where the fluid mixes with air, but she wasn't strong enough to sever the thick cartilage of its windpipe. Even though it won't be able to produce a true flame for years, the dragon is still trying. It wants to burn her. It gurgles and moans, unable to understand why it hasn't been able to kill this hairless animal yet.

Furious, it slithers forward and snaps at the knife in her hand. She jumps and lands awkwardly next to its neck, scrambling backwards to distance herself from those teeth . The wyrm's head is nearly as long as she is tall and she struggles to kick it away, stabbing blindly at its tongue, its jowls, its throat.

Her legs are strong but the beast is stronger. Her knife falls from her hand and she isn't fast enough to retrieve it. The dragon's mouth closes over her arm, lifts her above the ground, then twists her entire body in guttural, animal triumph.

The girl screams, clawing at the teeth embedded in her arm, tearing fingernails from her hand in an attempt to force it to loosen its grip. Blood flows from her arm in thick rivulets, reflecting the light from the torches.

The boy tries to run into the circle, but she falls before he can reach her. The priest drags the boy away, still unwilling to have anyone assist her. He must see this test to the end and he swears to kill the next one that tries disturbing her.

The hatchling's teeth, though nearly as long as the knife the girl just lost, are not yet as strong as those of a fully-grown dragon. Lodged between the thin bones of her forearm, a dislodged fang shines moon-white against the swollen flesh of her arm.

She looks once at the wyrm, then once at her arm. One, two...three white lumps in her skin. One is the fang itself, the other two the ends of her broken ulna, likely snapped when the beast was twisting her about like some snared rabbit. She stumbles, blind with pain, though still able to hear every soft rustle of the dragon's coils. Her vision clears long enough for her to see the beast watching her again. Jerking the fang free, she lurches forward and falls to her knees. Vomit bubbles behind her teeth, burning her throat so that she's choking on a stream of hot bile. She retches as the wyrm dives toward her once more, then the world fades into flame.

\-----

When she wakes, the dragon is gone, so is the moon and the crowd and most of the grass around her. The priest is convening with the sisters and all are muttering about fire and the test. She closes her eyes. All she wants is water. She no longer cares about the test.

"They want to make you the high priestess."

The girl doesn't have to open her eyes to know who is speaking to her. It's just him. She wants to tell him that he's being ridiculous, but she can't speak. She's not certain if she'll ever be able to speak again. Something like laughter escapes her, but even that dry exhalation is agony.

"How did you do that?" Cool fingers brush the hair away from her throat. "Nobody else has been able to do that, even when the girls eat the hearts."

How? She has no idea. The world opened and whispered to her and she knew something she didn't before.

"Not even the sisters can do that. How did you...?"

The girl groans and her eyes flutter open. The boy sees the blisters on her lips, how her eyes seem bluer than before against the reddened whites. He sees the plea for water, for rest, for quiet.

"Don't. Just...stay here. I'll be back."

So the boy runs. He doesn't know what else to do. He runs because he's never seen blue that deep.


	2. Chapter 2

_Come here, darling. Tell me what troubles you._

_Ah..._

_To be lonely isn't such a bad thing._

_Shall I tell you a story?_

_Listen closely, then..._

* * *

There was once a beautiful queen. Her hair was honey and her eyes were bluer than the sea at dawn. She was heavy with child and already blessed with a pair of lovely daughters, each as fair as their mother.

Her husband adored her, the kingdom was rich, and she knew a happiness like no other.

Still, for all her joys, she could not rest.

She nightly roamed the halls of her crystal palace, peering into empty rooms and closets, searching, always searching. Her daughters sang to her of colors long forgotten and waters that move like sand, yet she could not rest. Her beauty began to wither and fade and all the kingdom cried for her.

Soldiers were sent to far-away lands, returning with treasures and tales and songs.

Wizards consulted demons and angels alike, for the gods loved this queen as much as her people did and their servants wished her well.

The king arranged tournaments and festivals, filling the air with such a joyous clamor.

Still, the queen could not rest.

Though she ate as a mother should, she grew thin and pale, the child within her moving less and less with each passing day.

 _I hunger_ , she told her husband. _Arrange a great hunt. Fetch me boar and stag and all the fruits of the forest._  The king knighted the cooks and sent them forth in search of cinnamon and saffron and witch-spice, to tempt his queen's appetite.

 _I hunger_ , she told him again. _Bring me roots and berries and ice from the mountains. Bring me honeycomb and cream and trout from the sky. I hunger, good king._

He sent his wizards with the kitchen knights to shoot down the stars.

When the skies rained fire and the people were frightened, he bid them be at ease, for the sky mourned their queen's illness just as they did.

When the king presented his wife with the brilliant sky trout, glittering and twitching and gasping on the fine golden plates, she wept.  _Why do you not feed me, your grace? I bear your child and you seek to starve us? Fetch me water and wine and hazelnuts. Bring me a white fawn and a red blade. I hunger, good king._

The queen retired to her chambers and none heard from her for days. Her door remained locked and none but her daughters heard her voice.

The king sought to tear the door down, but his daughters begged his patience.

_She is sad, good father. She weeps for something she knows yet knows not. We hear her sing to us and she begs we attend her. Be patient, sweet king. We shall know her sorrow by morning._

The night passed and all was quiet but for the sad song of the queen. The king played at cards with his counselors, trying to hurry the hours. They drank black wine and told tales of valor, yet the king was troubled.

When the sun filled his chambers with golden light, his manservant opened his door and summoned him to the hall.

_You must hurry, your grace. Your daughters weep and the queen's servants have fled. The young princess is born and there is such sadness._

His daughters were standing without the chambers, all silent and still.

He commanded they speak.

They bit their tongues, afraid of their father.

He threatened them with the lash, something he had never done before, yet their fear frightened even him.

His eldest daughter, so close in fairness to her mother to be her twin and the prize of all the princes in the realm, stood with her bloodied chin red as her gown and tried to speak.

_What is this? Speak to me, daughter. Tell me of your mother. What of the babe?_

_She is gone, my father. She was born and cried and our mother devoured her before the birth-blood could be wiped from her brow. She bid we join her, father. Our mother has gone mad._

The king, horrified, entered the queen's chambers to find it so. His beautiful golden queen lay in her bed, weeping and lost, laughing.

 _What is this madness, witch, demon, fiend?_ The castle shook with the king's rage. _What have you done to my daughter?_

The queen wept again and the lands of their kingdom bubbled and split from her sorrow.

_We hungered, my king, and now we will never hunger again._

The poor king. He cast himself at his queen and beat her head against the floor til her golden locks were red. The princesses cried out and hid their faces. When the king leapt from the tower window and fell to the stones below, none of them saw his fall.

The eldest daughter commanded that the queen's chamber be sealed forever, closing the door herself, stone by carefully placed stone. The youngest mixed the mortar with her mother's blood and sealed her sister's work. The remaining servants were sent away and the sisters were called witches throughout the kingdom. _They'll suck your souls, I hear it told. They lie with beasts and learn to sing like demons. They know sorcery of all sorts, they do._

And one day, years later when the eldest had married and borne many daughters of her own, she bid her sister attend her.

_I am with child again, sweet sister, and I feel myself growing hungry. Bind my hands and take the babe from me. My husband need not know. Take the child and flee. Tell her of blue skies and a mother that loved her enough to never name her._

* * *

_Hush now._

_Dry those tears._

_Be grateful you're lonely, dearest._

_Your mother wept when we took you from her, too._


End file.
